A heat exchanger, such as an air conditioner, is constructed by stacking a plurality of heat exchanger fins, in which a plurality of through-holes have been formed to enable heat exchanger tubes to be inserted. Such heat exchanger fins are manufactured by a manufacturing apparatus for heat exchanger fins shown in FIG. 12. The manufacturing apparatus for heat exchanger fins is equipped with an uncoiler 12 where a thin metal plate (metal strip) 10 made of aluminum or the like has been wound into a coil. The metal strip 10 pulled out from the uncoiler 12 via pinch rollers 14 is inserted into an oil applying apparatus 16, where machining oil is applied onto the surface of the metal strip 10, and is then supplied to a mold 20 provided inside a press apparatus 18.
The mold 20 internally includes an upper mold die set 22 that is capable of up-down movement and a lower mold die set 24 that is static. The upper mold die set 22 is provided with a plurality of punches along the feeding direction of the metal strip 10. The lower mold die set 24 is provided with dies at positions that are opposite the plurality of punches of the upper mold die set 22. In one closing operation of the upper mold die set 22 and the lower mold die set 24, a plurality of collar-equipped through-holes (not illustrated and sometimes referred to simply as “through-holes” in the present specification) are formed at predetermined intervals in a predetermined direction along the feeding direction of the metal strip.
Note that a feeding apparatus 8 and an inter-row slit apparatus 9 are provided downstream of the mold apparatus 20. The feeding apparatus 8 inserts feed pins into the through-holes of the metal strip 10 and intermittently feeds the metal strip 10 by pulling the metal strip 10. After this, the metal strip 10 in which the through-holes have been formed is cut by the inter-row slit apparatus 9 in the width direction to form a plurality of metal strips of the product width. The metal strips 10 formed in this way are conveyed by a predetermined distance in a predetermined direction, cut into predetermined lengths by a cutoff apparatus 26, and then stacked in a stacker 28.